Changing Emphasis for Challenge of the Organizations within the Digital Wave

After the Paris edition of the Enterprise Digital SUMMIT our attention has turned to the London event in November where we Agile Elephants are supporting our friends at Kongress Media in organizing another exciting “learning experience” focusing on the on-going changes for the organization on their way into the digital age. Björn asked me to share my thoughts on this year’s planned agenda which I’m delighted to do.

The agenda and speakers for the Enterprise Digital SUMMIT / London are coming together nicely, and it’s clear from Paris, and discussions in our ecosystem of experts and practitioners, that there is a shift in emphasis. From theory to practice. From making the case for change to executing the plan. We’ll be leading that thinking with an emphasis on the pragmatic, that falls naturally in to our Agile Elephant mantra of – what works, what doesn’t, what next?

The next stage of challenges for the organizations in the digital age

In this 4th year of the Enterprise Digital Summit / London we have therefore set the bar even higher for ourselves to meet this changed state of discussions. With the discussions at the main conference on 16th November at The British Academy we need thus explore and discuss the following patterns that we see as the next stage of challenges for the organization on their way into the digital age:

Understanding the Economic Pattern of the Digital Age – a multi-dimensional problem where business models are being challenged more than ever, are changing faster than ever, and with job landscape in the process of change as organizations deploy Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning and Robotic Process Automation. Organizations have to understand the underlying patterns of the progressing automation of work – in production as well as in the field of the knowledge work.

Thinking Digital – all business is becoming software driven, every business is digitising more of what they do, and every business needs to execute faster. With a digital thinking at the heart of the organization practices like sharing knowledge, building relationships, and creating vibrant communities to meet the challenges of a even faster moving and more demanding environment become a crucial pattern for the organization.

Perceiving the Organization as a Platform – as we move further from a Taylorist, production line approach to business, we need to think beyond the traditional management pyramid to new patterns of connection, leadership and engagement to increase effectiveness and manage the flow of work wherever it occurs. The platform model aligns with the software pattern idea – building a stable core infrastructure and an ecosystem that meets the changing demands of the market environment.

Developing a Digital Culture as a Key Enabler – what are the skills, values, and behaviour for this new culture – organizations are in the need for exploring the key capabilities and building blocks of the operating model for the digital age. Our Agile Elephant approach on this is our 7E Model combining agile management with digital deployment techniques.

Discussing the Transformative Character of the Digital Workplace – as discussed before the Digital Workplace is not just a set of tools for supporting the collaboration and process performance, but as your organization’s gateway to doing change at scale, and the backbone for distributing the new mindset and cultural approach throughout your organization.

I will introduce the day and the keynote sequence starting by rethinking the organization for this new age of platforms and ecosystems. Our other keynote speakers are:

Christine Overby the Principal & Head of Research for our friends at Post*Shift will look to the underlying organizational principles, thinking through the operating system for the new digital landscape.

Sam Isaacson, Head of Digital Assurance at Grant Thornton will show how organizations need to develop a digital culture that makes business work better.

2) Supporting a Digital way of working

Running up to lunch we will hear how to put these ideas in to practice:

Tania Tasheva the Change & Communication Lead at Heineken will give a case study of their transformational change.

Ralf Larsson, Director Online Employee Engagement and Development at Electrolux will explain how they changed user, leadership & workplace behaviour across their company.

Janet Parkinson, Agile Elephant Founder and CXO will moderate a panel with even more experts from Digital Workplace & Transformation community like Wedge Black and Silvia Cambie (more to come) to discuss how digital marketing, social collaboration and the online workplace is shifting from websites, landing pages and individual apps to conversational commerce command line with chat apps, chatbots and the rise of artificial intelligence and cognitive computing.

As usual at the Summit we will use some of the afternoon to break in to a choice of workshop groups to get you directly involved in discussing these ideas, and talking through your own experiences. This year’s workshops are:

We’ll move back to practice talks and case studies to highlight the how and the what of making the digital workplace work:

Calum Haswell, EMEA Intranet Manager of White & Case LLP will talk through the story of their Digital Workplace Practice

Tereza Urbankova, Head of Corporate Communications at Amec Foster Wheeler plc will explain how they engineered a World-Class Intranet

Tanya Burak, Director of Internal Communications at Savills plc will explain their experience creating more employee engagement with the Connect Platform

7) Key success factors for the Digital Transformation of the Workplace

I’ll bring things together and to a close, moderating a town hall discussion of the whole group to talk through the highlights of the day, what we’ve learned and to pick out what works, what doesn’t and where the digital workplace is heading next.

Of course there will be plenty of time for networking g during the breaks and after the show. As usual we will have a one day pre-conference workshop on 15th November. It will be a comprehensive, practical session on how to plan and establish a successful social and digital workplace transformation – more information for that at workshop.enterprise-digital.co.uk

The typical firm recognises that Digital Transformation is real, that the workplace needs to change, but there are no one size fits all solutions. Too many organisations think tools first when they should be thinking about their customer’s, employee’s and stakeholder’s needs, and the culture and behaviours required to change. Many don’t have a plan that considers their operation from end to end across all of their business processes. Every organisation is at a different stage of transformation, but there are common threads that promote success which we will highlight. We need different leadership and different thinking. We need a mindset of “business as unusual” and continuous reinvention – but these are people factors not technology. Our agenda is designed to get you thinking around these issues so you can make a plan that works.